


The Baking of a New Friendship

by OceanTheSoulRebel



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Baking, F/M, Flirting, Fluff, Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-22
Updated: 2020-01-22
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:08:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22365409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OceanTheSoulRebel/pseuds/OceanTheSoulRebel
Summary: Cullen, aching and tired in the night, seeks out solace from the kitchen and finds something else--but maybe something not so different.
Relationships: Cullen Rutherford & Female Trevelyan, Cullen Rutherford/Female Trevelyan
Comments: 2
Kudos: 31





	The Baking of a New Friendship

A crash clatters from the kitchen ahead, and a loud string of curses echoes in the hallway. Cullen reaches for his dagger, fingers twitching with his exhaustion, only to find it missing. Damnation, he forgot to put it back on when he disarmed before bed, trading armor for his sleeping clothes. 

"Hello?" he calls, voice wavering in the late-night hour. It is ridiculous. Skyhold keep is one of the most fortified castles he's seen outside of Denerim, and Lady Trevelyan is a capable mistress in running it while in the keep. He and the other of her advisors are all smart, competent people. There's really no reason to be waiting outside the kitchen door, his stomach in knots and joints on fire. 

Cullen, still, only stands outside, listening. A voice mutters to itself in exasperation beyond the solid oak; another loud clang rings out. He bites the inside of his cheek and trails his hand back to his sheathed knife, tilting it forward in its holster for easier access. The kitchen had a service entrance, one that led to the outside. The person could be a spy, an assassin, or even… 

The chef. 

He shudders. 

With a quiet sigh, he pushes open the door, wishing he had something more substantial between him and a potential threat than his fur mantle and sleeping shirt, and finds himself face to face with—

"My lady," Cullen says, dumbly. 

Lady Trevelyan stands, equally dumbstruck, holding a spilling sack of flour that has broken at a side seam and dressed her in white. She drops the bag. "S—Ser Cullen," she stammers. "I hadn't expected you. What are you doing awake?" 

"I—what are you doing in the kitchen? You have—" 

"If you say 'I have servants for this,' I'm going to have to smack you. Warning you now." 

"I… was going to say you have a meeting in a few hours," he says slowly. Cullen was absolutely going to say that, though the look on her face makes him reconsider that gut reaction. 

Lady Trevelyan deflates. "I know, I know," she says, shoving a flour-dusted hand through her mussed hair. Cullen tracks the motion with his gaze before tearing back to her face. "I just… I wanted to do something nice." 

"Something nice?" 

She nods. "I asked Chef Honore for permission to work in her kitchen this morning. I wanted to…" She blushes and looks away before muttering something under her breath.

"I'm sorry," Cullen says, soft, "I didn't catch that." 

"I said I wanted to make you some cookies!" 

Cullen stares at her, bewildered, and scratches at the back of his neck. "I… you…" 

"You said you were feeling homesick, that time we played chess, and I thought—I thought it could be nice, to surprise you. I, uh. I'll go." 

"No! Please." Cullen reaches out, hands spread, palms up placatingly. Sometimes she is like a spooked horse, he's come to realize. Any unexpected motion could cause her to bolt, and he's seen her on the field and fight her way out of a cornering. He takes a step back. "Lady Trevelyan—" 

"Evelyn," she mutters, shifting on her feet.

"...Evelyn." It's one thing to think of her name, and another to say it, to address her this way. Cullen studies her, rough around the edges, sharp despite the lack of sleep he knows she must suffer. It's soft, softer than her, yet fits perfectly. 

Even Josephine and Leliana don't call her by her given name—not to her face, anyway. He's not sure how he feels about that fact. 

"Evelyn," he tries again, dropping his hands. "Perhaps we could bake together?" 

She blinks owlishly at him. "I--I suppose we could do that." Evelyn takes a breath and walks the broken bag of flour to the far wall, dropping it in a dusty cloud. "I…" She stands and turns to him, eyebrow quirked. "What are you doing here, Ser Cullen?" 

"Just Cullen, please; I'm no longer a Templar, and now you've seen me in just my shirt-sleeves, I feel we could be better acquainted," he says dryly. The moment stretches out, and his words catch up with him. A furious flush burns its way across his face like a brand. His stomach knots in his gut. "Not that I think--I mean-- I'm so-- Maker's breath." 

Evelyn laughs, and the sudden tension that rankled his middle releases. "Cullen," she says, slowly, as if rolling the syllables along her tongue. She smiles. "I like that. It's been… how long have I been here?"

"Ten months, I believe."

"So long already," she murmurs. "It's been at least that long since anyone other than my family has used my given name. It's… comforting. I'd like you to, if you—" Evelyn cuts off with a groan. "I'm sorry, I'm not usually this brainless," she says. "Cookies?" 

Cullen grins. "Lead the way, then, Evelyn." 

He stokes the fire to life as she pulls down oiled wooden bowls and spoons from their various cubbies. She pulls her hair back into a low tail before measuring out her ingredients with deliberate precision. Cullen helps her cream the butter and sugar, allowing himself to wince only when she's turned away. 

It's after she's added the other ingredients and left him to mix them that his ruse is up; his shoulder screams, and he grunts, dropping the spoon to the floor when his hand goes numb. 

"Damn." His back aches when he bends. "Damn, damn, damn," he breathes. When Cullen straightens up again, Evelyn stares at him, brows drawn with concern. 

"You're hurt," she says softly. 

He shakes his head. "It's nothing." She doesn't relent, only scrunching her face further, and Cullen sighs. "I… sometimes my joints ache, my lady," he murmurs. Cullen scrubs his hands down his face, fingers catching on the day-old stubble along his jaw. "Years of hard work, and the…" 

Meredith's face flashes before his mind's eye. She had seemed so reasonable back then, in the beginning. She personally had overseen his increase in lyrium intake, to better protect him, she had said. To better protect the mages from demons, from themselves. 

"It's nothing," he says again. "Just old pain." 

Evelyn reaches out, but her hand hovers uncertainly between them. "Cullen," she says, "is it the lyrium?"

He takes in a sharp breath. 

"My brother Maxwell was a Templar. He was discharged after becoming gravely ill, and he… he was hardly the same." Evelyn worries her lip between her teeth before continuing. "There were days that he would barely interact with us and some days... the screaming… But there was a time, he had come back to us, for a brief, shining moment." Her voice shakes, and she smiles wanly. "He said he didn't regret it, his service, but wished he had known beforehand what the lyrium does, what it made him see. He said--he said it was like a poison." 

Cullen's blood runs cold in his veins. His hands shake, and he balls them into fists behind his back. "What happened to your brother, if I may ask?" 

Evelyn sighs. "My father had him sent to a monastery in Orlais, where they helped aging templars in their later years. He… was not fond of the man my brother had become. The transition of Maxwell being home had been difficult for our parents. It was after he had left that I was given to the Chantry. A Trevelyan has been among its ranks for ages, and it was apparently my turn, since Maxwell left." 

"I'm sorry." Cullen bites his tongue. _I'm sorry your parents deem their children so disposable._

"Oh, Maker." Evelyn flushes bright red along her cheeks, the blush crawling down her neck. "I'm sorry, here I am, burdening you with everything. I just… If I may say, Cullen, you… it's so incredibly easy to talk to you." She chuckles, a touch nervous. "It must be the late hour. It makes friends of us all, I fear." 

"I would like that, to be your friend. If I may," Cullen adds as an afterthought. "I know that we're in a war and that there is little room for sentiment. I know that your duties keep you busy, but…" 

A small smile coaxes its way across her face and brings him to a stop. "I'd like that too," Evelyn says, tucking an errant lock of hair behind her ear. "I'd like that a lot, actually." 

Cullen smiles, and her gaze softens. "Well then," he says, gesturing to the mixing bowl, "why don't we consider these… friendship cookies?" 

Her bubbling laughter fills the room, and Cullen finds himself aching less, focusing on the way her happiness echoes off the kitchen walls.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> This story is part of the LLF Comment Project, which was created to improve communication between readers and authors. I invite and appreciate feedback, including:
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